About Windows Software of the Day

Windows has hundreds of thousands of programs. Because of this great volume and lack of a central store, software discovery (aka finding new and useful programs) is extremely difficult. With our Windows Software of the Day initiative, dotTech aims to change that. Everyday we post three programs, allowing our readers to discover new software, daily. Enjoy! [Subscribe to our Windows section to never miss an article: RSS Feed | E-mail]

Software for April 22, 2012

National Geographic Photo of the Day Wallpaper Changer

If you’ve ever picked up a National Geographic magazine, you’ve probably noticed their amazing photography. Now imaging that same high-resolution, high-quality photography as your background and you’ve got National Geographic Photo of the Day Wallpaper Changer, or NGPotDWC for short.

If you really like one day’s photograph, you can add it to your archive. Your archive is a collection of previous NGPotD photos that you either really enjoyed or, in the case of the automatic archiving function, every photo since you started using NGPotDWC.

I personally quite enjoy the National Geographic Photo of the Day myself, and with this automatic wallpaper changer, I think it’ll be making an appearance on my desktop for quite a while.

If you need to know information about various domains, WhoisThisDomain can be a great help. It’ll automatically choose the correct servers, so there’s no need to poke around for the correct server yourself, and it can handle multiple domains like a breeze.

PeaZip

Use WinRAR or WinZIP? Try PeaZip – it’s like WinRAR or WinZIP but better. PeaZip is actually open source and comes with a nicely designed interface that makes it easy to use.

PeaZip can support pretty much anything you throw at it, too. It can create 13 different kinds of archives, and supports the extraction of over 130 types — all while featuring its two-paned, button-driven interface that gives it an edge over 7-zip.

PeaZip can also split, join, and encrypt files. No matter what you want to do with your files, there’s a way that PeaZip can do it!

Note: on installation, please be sure to select Custom and uncheck the integrated AVG bundleware.

dotTechies: We have tested all the software listed above. However, Windows Software of the Day articles are not intended as “reviews” but rather as “heads-up” to help you discover new programs. Always use your best judgement when downloading programs, such as trying trial/free versions before purchasing shareware programs, if applicable.

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About Locutus

Who is the mysterious Locutus? No one knows, but there is an ancient tale that once his true identity is revealed, something big will happen. What? Who knows. The name Locutus is based off of the Star Trek: The Next Generation character Jean-Luc Picard.

11 comments

Guyt

@Larry
Strange, I tried it with no problems. Flagging and unflagging AVG the installer did exactly what I selected. Then I used CCleaner and TuneUp utilities and they did not find any leftover upon install.

Larry

Although, I elected NOT to accept AVG as my search engine, not only did the installation program install a folder with numerous AVG files, no uninstall file, but added AVG as an Add-on to my IE9 and changed my primary search engine from Google to AVG.

To get rid of all of these files I had too uninstall PeaZip, remove the AVG from the C:\Program Files but also ran CCleaner to get rid of the unwanted files and registry, I notice also that it modified all my files with different “compression” extension to PeaZip; although I deselected the option under their program for these files – had to select one file with each extension such as RAR, ZIP, …. and modify it to the program I wanted to use to open these files.

PeaZip may be a good tool but I wish they would respect our choice of search engines AND leave the choice of the program to open other zip files.

Faber

Jeanjean

- I used also 7-zip without problem ; then I tested “Bandizip” (based on the former I think) recently and I kept it (http://www.bandicam.com/bandizip/) primarily to save space in the right click options.
– About the Nat Geo Wallpaper downloader, it works fine. If a wallpaper is copyright, you can make a right clic on the photo of the Nat Geo site (follow the link gived by the downloader).
Another way to download all the wallpapers (copyright or not) is to use “Natgeoget” (http://www.softoxi.com/geonatget.html)
Thanks for the reviews Locutus and good trip !

Steve

1. Wipe out Windows EXTRACT ALL right-click option, AND even if you uninstall Peazip, EXTRACT ALL will be gone. (Luckily, I have GoBack!)
2. Once you unzip a file with Peazip, you may find your right-click options are limited, including the ability to virus scan the extracted files.

I did not fully check out Peazip’s options, so possibly there is a way around my comment 2, but comment 1 is for certain, at least in Win XP.

ebony

@ Locutus : Thanks for review on Peazip. I was using 7-zip for a while and then I starting using Pzip, but could not decide which was better. I like Pzip because it allows me to highlight and right click and select my options. I think I will stick with it. Enjoy your trip.

Locutus

I’m going on a trip, and I’ll be back this Friday. I’ve got Windows software of the day posts planned out for this week, but I won’t be able to respond to any of your comments until Friday or Saturday.